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When facing a lecture hall with 400 seats, it can be challenging to engage
every student. Two introductory psychology professors at Laurier have found a
way to use students’ own digital devices to engage them with course
material.

Last month, professors Joanne Lee and Eileen
Wood in Laurier’s Department of Psychology piloted an innovative online
psychology lab program called Deckchair Learning Systems in an effort to
introduce students to critical content and scientific methods.

The software was developed by Jeff Graham, a
professor of psychology at the University of Toronto, in collaboration with
Allan Sura, CEO and Creative Director of Deckchair. It offers a lab-style
experience to larger lectures by getting students to participate simultaneously
in hands-on activities using their laptop or mobile device.

Lee and Wood ran demonstrations in their
classes that allowed students to participate in two psychological exercises; one
to determine whether the students have an unconscious bias towards traditional
gender roles, and another to examine the impact of meditation on memory and
performance. By answering questions simultaneously through the Deckchair
software — using the laptop, smartphone or tablet they would bring to class
anyway — the students produced instant dynamic results for the experiment, which
they then analyzed.

“It is challenging to provide relevant
experience in the methods of our discipline in large introductory psychology
classes,” said Wood. “This unique platform allows students to engage
individually with the software and interactively in subsequent group work that
incorporates the findings with their reflections and understanding of the
content.”

“First-year students often miss critical
learning opportunities such as lab work when they are in these large courses,”
said Lee. “This software augments learning and makes learning tangible as
students learn from first hand experience with their own outcomes and the
summarized outcomes from all of their peers.”

This pilot project will lay the groundwork
for inclusion of these innovative teaching tools in the coming academic year.